Been offered shares in US company as payment - how do I turn those into cash?

Confused1069

Hi,

I'm not experienced in the world of shares and so apologies for the basic questions...

I own a domain name which a company in America is looking to buy. They don't have the cash and so have offered me shares in their company in exchange.

The shares are subject to a SEC holding period which means I have to keep them for a year before selling. I can live with that.

My question is: in 12 months time, how do I actually go about selling them and turning them into cash?
- Is there a website I can go to?
- Does it have to be done through the bank?
- How do I actually find a buyer? Is it possible that no one will want my shares?
- Does it matter that they're a US company?
- How much tax will I have to pay? (the shares are apparantly worth a lot of money)

I am a real newbie here - to quote Manuel from Fawlty Towers "I know nothing" (when it comes to shares).

Many thanks for any help/advice you could give.

richy999

Are the shares being offered in their company?... if so, I would question the value of any shares in a company with such poor cash flow.

Are the shares publicly traded?

My scam alert is going off.

Sam_J12

I agree with Richy - I am suspicious here. Any reasonably solvent company could afford a domain name costing a few hundred or thousands of dollars. How much do you value the domain name at?

Confused1069

Hi guys, thanks for the replies.

The shares are publicly traded, yes.

I am happy that the company is legit. The offer for the domain is 6 figures.

I understand the scam worries, but it is a domain I don't need and thus at worst, the shares are worthless and I don't have the domain anymore (no big deal to be honest).

My question was more along the lines of - how do I actually sell them. Can I just list them on a website?

Thanks

[Deleted User]

Hi,

you would need to trade them through a broker or bank, google 'trading US shares'.

Do you know the share price?

Confused1069

It's currently $1.75 per share

glentoran99

Confused1069 wrote: »

Hi guys, thanks for the replies.

The shares are publicly traded, yes.

I am happy that the company is legit. The offer for the domain is 6 figures.

I understand the scam worries, but it is a domain I don't need and thus at worst, the shares are worthless and I don't have the domain anymore (no big deal to be honest).

My question was more along the lines of - how do I actually sell them. Can I just list them on a website?

Thanks

think you need a rethink on that, that is not the worst!!


Think about it for them to give you these shares how much personal information are you going to have to hand over


The scam alert is ringing very high!!! 6 figure sum for a domain? I find that hard to believe tbh, so manay extensions about these days I fail to understand why a company would pay so much

glentoran99

I can also see the next step being some sort of "fee" you need to pay so they can authorise the transfer of shares

[Deleted User]

Hi,

mmm, could be a scam.

It could be that somebody is wanting to [STRIKE]buy[/STRIKE] obtain your domain name then sell it on, and the shares you get'll not be worth the paper they're printed on in a years time.

HouseBuyer77

You need to determine what exchange they're listed on. In the UK we have the AIM market, which is for small companies and somewhat of a wild west, it's a risky place to trade as values can change suddenly. I presume the US has a similar place. If they're on it that's not good.

Once you've found out the exchange they're listed on determine how long they've been publically traded, what has the price done over this time. What is the market cap (total shares * price)? What is the trade volume (number of shares traded per day).

If you're happy the price looks stableish and they have a good trade volume (meaning easy to sell). Then this may all be fine.

However any company that is offering stock in lieu of cash for such a purchase is unlikely to be a decent stable company (otherwise they would have the cash available).

The SEC holding period sounds a little odd too. Do you know the reasoning behind it? Are you sure they're not offering options. These allow you to purchase shares for an agreed price from a certain time in the future, the idea being that when the time comes to use the options the shares are more expensive than the agreed price so you can make an instant profit.